Private City of the Dead

[Thelma Goth]

Thelma's Tailoring was a little shop with a quaint painted sign hanging above the door. Inside the recently repaired display window, a droid was changing the clothes on a pair of pale, faceless mannequins, swapping them for the latest fall fashions.

The surrounding businesses were in worse shape. Smashed windows, battered doors, and scattered trash made it clear this was a sketchy part of town. Yet the tailor somehow remained untouched, a bright spot amid the downtown grime and muck.

Though Griffin had told Alicio to meet at this place, no friendly face came out to greet him. The parking lot was deserted, apart from a single speeder that sat idling. A cold breeze swept fallen leaves across the pavement. The droid smoothed out the wrinkles in the last sweater, then disappeared behind the curtain backdrop. Either Alicio was meant to head inside, or something had gone wrong. The Force was uncharacteristically silent on the matter.

Alicio Organa​

 

[Alicio Organa]

A dark-cloaked man paused at the awning of the quiet little boutique, taking a good long look at the signage. It was certainly a low-key meeting area, even if the name Thelma and the displays of beautiful dresses in the windows seemed to set off some distant memory in Alicio's mind. He took it in a moment longer, peering into the Future, and finding a stale frown at what he saw. Or, more accurately, what he didn't see.

Perhaps on any other planet, the nondescript flowing cape and dark face obscured by a shadowed hood would've seemed a little out of place. But this was Necropolis. Dark and mysterious was the norm. Alicio fit right in.

A small group of young women swept past him, parting around his form, not even seeming to notice the cloaked man. Their expressions seemed to stare through him, as if the nobleman were invisible. Or, more accurately, as if they forgot him as soon as they saw him. Alicio had made more use of the skill since becoming... considerably more ubiquitous in recent days. He never felt entirely good about using his particular brand of stealth, affecting others' minds so their perceptions slipped off of him... but the day called for secrecy. There could be no room for error.

The security of an entire planet hung in the balance. It was not the time for half-measures.

Chancellor Organa pushed through the doorway.

- Thelma Goth -

 

[Thelma Goth]

A soft bell rang as the door opened, signaling that a customer had entered. A very petite young woman with long auburn hair came from the back of the shop, her quick movements and darting gaze immediately betraying that she was on edge. Something would tell Alicio that he ought to let her see him—and not just because it would be cruel to hide himself when the chime had already summoned her to the entrance, expecting to greet a visitor. It was the day after Hallowe’en; the time for scares was over.

"Hello, how can I help—" She paused upon seeing Alicio, recognition crossing her features. "Oh, Your Maje—Chancellor Organa!" After a stumbling start trying to remember how to properly address him, she swept into a curtsy, smiling bashfully. "I'm the—I'm Thelma. Your wife Amani has commissioned me before. How can I help you today?"

Thelma did not seem to fit the rogue's gallery of vampiric thugs, voodoo sorcerers, and rogue agents Alicio had thus far encountered in his Necropolitan adventures. She was so very small and pitifully thin, her wasted body indicative of long, slow starvation—yet she was too well-dressed to be impoverished. An elegant green dress hung from her skeletal frame, draped in such a way as to give the illusion of more bulk. But not even the richest fabric could hide her hollow cheeks and sunken eyes.

Was she the heir Griffin had spoken of? The eddies of the Force now seemed to hone in on the tiny seamstress, though what role she had to play in their plans remained unclear. Neither Griffin nor any of Sycorax's other allies were here yet to confirm it.

Were Alicio to look deeper into his surroundings, he would notice something else that was strange—a lingering essence, like the sillage of a scent. While faint, it was instantly recognizable as belonging to Valery Noble —and it wasn't vanishing the way it would if she had merely been there recently and left. Whatever was generating the impression of the Jedi Grandmaster, it was still here.

Alicio Organa​